Data Breach Alert: Auto parts retailer exposes tens of thousands

Posted by Joe on March 31st, 2008

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Advance Auto Parts, an auto parts chain with locations throughout the US, began mailing letters to approximately 56,000 customers whose financial information may have been exposed their financial information.

The company announced only that a “network intrusion” had exposed financial data. No additional information on how unauthorized parties had accessed the data or even exactly what data may have been exposed is currently available.

Fourteen of the retailer’s stores are believed to have been impacted in the breach, including locations in Georgia, Ohio, Louisiana, Tennessee, Mississippi, Indiana, Virginia and New York.

To learn more about protecting your identity read our guide to identity theft protection services.

• Data Breach Alert: Tens of thousands impacted in Antioch College data breach
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• Data Breach Alert: Student hacker puts 35,000 teachers and staff on alert

Vonage makes customer support a top priority

Posted by Joe on March 31st, 2008

After doubling in size over the last two years, the top executives at Vonage have decided to make an even more aggressive push to improve customer services available to their more than 2.6 million subscribers.

Vonage’s founder and CEO, Jeffrey Citron, admits that the company’s rapid growth made it difficult to keep up with consumer demand for support services. Said Citron:

“We grew very, very fast, and along the way as a company a few things got out of hand”.

One of the most tangible improvements for Vonage subscribers will be a new customer support call routing system which will attempt to funnel inbound calls to support locations with available representatives. Vonage had previously routed calls to the closest support cebter whether or not their were available support reps which could lead to long call wait times in busy areas.

We commend Vonage on their steps to continue to improve customer support despite their strong leadership position in the consumer VoIP market.

Our in-depth research has shown that Vonage is the best overall VoIP provider of the dozens we have seen in the marketplace. You can learn more about Vonage and other VoIP providers by visiting our VoIP service provider comparison guide.

• Reader Question: Is Vonage better than my cable company’s phone service?
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Data Breach Alert: Boston museum patron’s credit card numbers exposed on public website

Posted by Joe on March 31st, 2008

The names, credit card numbers and other personal information of about 140 visitors to the Boston Museum of Science were inadvertently published on the museum’s publicly available website earlier this month.

All of the impacted consumers had taken classes at the museum and their payment information was stored in a computer file. That file was accidently posted on the museum’s website by a contract employee. An additional 183 consumers had just their names exposed on the site as well.

Learn more about how to protect your identity in our identity theft service protection guide.

• Data Breach Alert: Over 10 million eBay Korea users impacted in massive hack
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Data Breach Alert: San Quentin visitors exposed to inmates, identity theft

Posted by Joe on March 31st, 2008

A flash drive containing the names, drivers license numbers and date of birth of approximately 3,500 recent visitors to the San Quentin Prison in northern California was lost last week according to prison officials.

Prison guards routinely used the flash drive to move information collected from visitors from the prison’s administrative office to computers located at the facility’s two entrance gates. The information was discovered missing last Friday.

Learn more about identity theft protection by reading our in-depth identity theft protection service reviews.

• Data Breach Alert: Theft puts 13,000 Pfizer employees at risk
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Data Breach Alert: Tens of thousands impacted in Antioch College data breach

Posted by Joe on March 31st, 2008

The names, social security numbers and other personal information of over 70,000 current and former students, employees and applicants of Antioch College in Ohio have been exposed due to a break in on a University computer.

University officials said that the computer had been accessed at least three times by unauthorized outside parties. The data exposed goes back over ten years to 1996.

To learn more about protecting your identity view our identity theft protection service comparison.

• Data Breach Alert: College students receive social security numbers of classmates over email
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• Data Breach Alert: Stolen laptop leaves thousands of Connecticut State students exposed
• Data Breach Alert: Massachusetts college exposes 20,000 personal identities

Reports say passport snooping is part of training program

Posted by Joe on March 27th, 2008

What initially looked like a case of political impropriety is now turning into a government sponsored privacy debacle which highlights just how vulnerable personal information can be.

Reports began surfacing last week that a State Department contractor had breached the passport records of Sen. Barack Obama. It was later found that the same contractor had also illegally accessed Sen. John Mccain’s passport file and that Sen. Hillary Clinton’s information had been accessed during a State Department training session last summer. None of these individuals were aware of these security breaches of their personal information until now.

The Associated Press is now reporting that over twenty celebrity passport records had been accessed by contractors. Additionally, it appears that new employees and contractors are encouraged to access passport files as a part of their training regiment.

Passport records include extremely sensitive information, including name, date of birth, address and social security numbers, that could be lead to many forms of identity theft in the wrong hands. The fact that sensitive personal information could be so routinely mismanaged by a government agency should be a wake up call to all of us.

As always, we strongly suggest that consumers consider empowering themselves with an identity theft protection service. Learn more in our free online identity theft protection service comparison.

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• Shop safely this holiday season

Facebook phishing scams increase risk of identity theft on the popular social network

Posted by Joe on March 27th, 2008

Several sources began reporting a phishing scam this week targeted at users of Facebook.

Impacted users are seeing wall posts, messages that any visitor to a Facebook profile page can leave for the page’s owner, with the following message:

“Hey, I got a new facebook account. Im going to delete this one, so add my new profile”

Accompanying the message is a link to a site that appears to be a Facebook login page which prompts users to enter their Facebook username and password. This page is NOT associated with Facebook and it is likely that the goal of the scam is to get Facebook users to expose their login information. As we discussed in our Facebook identity theft protection guide, this information can be the gateway to identity theft or worse.

What makes this type of phishing attack so potent is that the messages appear to come from friends of the Facebook user receiving the message while, in fact, they are coming from some criminal third party.

We strongly suggest that Facebook use caution when clicking on any links within messages received within Facebook. It is also a good idea to verify any messages you receive from Facebook friends through some other communication channel such as email or phone.

Learn more in our Facebook identity theft protection guide and guide to identity theft protection services.

• How to report a fake profile page on Facebook
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• Facebook security flaw exposes personal information
• Your new Facebook friend just stole your identity
• Facebook Identity Theft Protection Guide: 6 tips to protect your identity on Facebook

How to report a fake profile page on Facebook

Posted by Joe on March 26th, 2008

A recent commenter on our Facebook identity theft protection guide asked how to report someone who has created a fake Facebook profile in her name. After doing some quick research, we found that Facebook makes it fairly easy to report a fake profile.

If you already have a Facebook account simply visit the Facebook “Report a Fake Profile” page and enter the requested information.

If you don’t have a Facebook account you can ask a friend that does have an account to report the fake page on your behalf. Alternatively, you can send an email to “login@facebook.com”. Briefly explain that a fake profile has been created in your name and provide your contact information so that a member of the Facebook support team may contact you to investigate the matter further.

Someone setting up a fake Facebook profile in your name may be a sign of even more serious identity theft. Read our Facebook identity theft protect guide and guide to identity theft protection services to learn more.

• Facebook phishing scams increase risk of identity theft on the popular social network
• Facebook security flaw exposes personal information
• Your new Facebook friend just stole your identity
• Facebook moves to protect users in partnership with 49 states
• Facebook Identity Theft Protection Guide: 6 tips to protect your identity on Facebook

Facebook security flaw exposes personal information

Posted by Joe on March 26th, 2008

We created our Facebook identity theft protection guide to help raise awareness about the security risks that are present in the popular social network. Now it appears that a Vancouver based programer has exposed a security flaw in Facebook that has been shown to expose personal information on user profile pages.

The existence of the security loophole was confirmed by the Associated Press after they were tipped off by Byron Ng, a Canadian computer specialist. The AP was able to use Ng’s techniques to view private photo albums posted by the site’s CEO< mark Zuckerberg, among others.

Facebook took immediate action to address the security flaw as soon as they were made aware of it. According to Facebook spokeswoman Brandee Barker the issue was fixed within an hour.

We strongly believe that consumers should understand what risks are associated with using social networks such as Facebook so that they can enjoy them safely. To learn more check out our Facebook identity theft protection guide.

• Facebook phishing scams increase risk of identity theft on the popular social network
• How to report a fake profile page on Facebook
• Facebook moves to protect users in partnership with 49 states
• Your new Facebook friend just stole your identity
• Help us help you protect yourself from identity theft

Data Breach Alert: Student hacker puts 35,000 teachers and staff on alert

Posted by Joe on March 26th, 2008

Teachers and employees of the Broward School District in Coconut Creek, FL are being asked to keep a close eye on their financial records after an area high school student hacked district computers and exposed their personal information.

A senior at the local Atlantic Technical High School was able to extract social security numbers, names and addresses of over 35,000 individuals. The student has been identified, suspended for two weeks and being evaluated for expulsion.

To learn more about protecting your identity visit our identity theft protection service guide.

• Data Breach Alert: Harvard hack exposed more data than initially thought
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• Data Breach Alert: Stolen laptop leaves thousands of Connecticut State students exposed
• Data Breach Alert: College students receive social security numbers of classmates over email